By

Share

Blog Roll

The Week Ahead: Nov. 5 to 11

Opening night of “L.A. Stories: Videos From the West Coast” at Norton Museum of Art, 1451 S. Olive Ave., West Palm Beach; open until 9 p.m.; $5 to $12; 561/832-5196 or www.norton.org

We’ve probably seen or read enough L.A. stories in tawdry crime novels, grisly TV shows and glitzy movies. Many of them probably revolve around shallow celebrities, vain movie producers, dead hookers and copious cocaine. There’s a lot more to the city, of course, and the four artists in the video exhibition “L.A. Stories” hope to explore them, while pushing the boundaries of narrative as we know it. In their dynamic videos, Eileen Cowin, Mark Daybell, Judy Fiskin and Julie Orser will tackle subjects such as voyeurism, our education system, notions of “happily ever after,” and 1950s melodramas. Also, be sure to check out “New Works/New Directions: Recent Acquisitions of Photography,” which opens today as well.

Tap treasure Glover, whom Gregory Hines described as “the best tap dancer who ever lived,” has gone a long way toward bringing world-music rhythms – especially African funk – into the traditional hoofing pantheon, and he has brought his craft to such esteemed venues as the White House and the Smithsonian Institute. Just seven months after touring a show to Miami’s Arsht Center, Glover is back with all-new production. Titled “STePz,” this one will marry tap’s past, present and future through the complexity of jazz phrasing.

The “fingers” in the title of this upbeat musical refer to a talented piano man; the “toes” stand in for a snappy tap dancer. Together, “Fingers” and “Toes,” as they call themselves are on the precipice of a Broadway hit, having conned a producer on the Great White Way into staging their dance spectacular; the problem is, they haven’t written a dance spectacular, nor cast one, nor have any idea how to approach their subject, which happens to be love. “Fingers and Toes” arrives shrewdly at the cusp of a popular revival in tap music worldwide, and it will feature a terrific flown-in cast whose Broadway credits include work in “Chicago,” “The Addams Family” and “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.” This inside-showbiz musical will run through Nov. 24.

Opera productions by composers who are still alive are about as common as UFO sightings; most of us have heard tell of their existence but relatively few have lived to see them. Joining Florida Grand Opera’s tried-and-true repertory of long-dead masters this season – your Puccinis, your Verdis, your Massenets – is a work by a less familiar name: Mark David Levy, a Fort Lauderdale resident who back in 1967 adapted Eugene O’Neill’s play cycle “Mourning Becomes Electra” as a three-act opera using an English libretto. The result garnered a 25-minute standing ovation when New York’s Metropolitan Opera premiered it, but it became virtually lost to time for the next 30 years. Florida Grand Opera is just the fifth company to perform the opera, which has undergone new revisions courtesy of its composer. It deals with such heated operatic terrain as infidelity, revenge and families torn asunder.

Like Billy Bragg before him, English singer-songwriter Frank Turner has charted the seemingly uncrossable divide between heart-on-sleeve acoustic folk and blistering, eardrum-splitting punk rock – often in the same song, such as his recent show-stopper “Four Simple Words.” Like the dutiful underground bands he eulogizes in his songs, Turner spent his first 10-plus years in music toiling without much pay or mainstream attention, before turning heads and winning awards with his exceptional 2011 release “England Keep My Bones.” This year’s “Tape Deck Heart,” with its upbeat jangle, wry humor and candid confessionals, is even better, and these days Turner is just as likely to play arenas as intimate clubs like the Culture Room. The Smith Street Band and Koo Koo Kanga Roo will open the show.

Knowing that the term “fear up harsh” is a military code concerning “enhanced interrogation techniques,” expect this world premiere play by Christopher Demos-Brown to be hard-hitting and provocative. It opens in pitch-blackness, with an intense battle scene in Iraq lit only by piercing tracers. A Marine is badly wounded and saved by an Army corporal, as far as we can tell; he is then awarded a Medal of Honor, and the play charts the mysterious events that led to the accolade, as well as the impact the medal has had on the paralyzed soldier, in a structure that oscillates between flashbacks and the present day. It sounds like another bold, audacious and surprisingly humorous work from this excellent local playwright, courtesy of Miami’s Zoetic Stage. “Fear Up Harsh” runs through Nov. 24.

Last November, this new foodie fest debuted downtown with much anticipation. Event promoter Nancy Stewart-Franczak says she received mostly rave reviews, but some attendees griped about the festival’s titular misnomer: They couldn’t find any seafood, leaving them no choice but to visit Avenue restaurants and spend an arm and a leg for a tail and a fin. Hopefully, the Delray Beach Wine and Seafood Festival’s growing pains are behind it; the event promises an “expanded menu” of seafood dishes, including lobster rolls, conch ceviche, fried clams, fish tacos, gazpacho, mussels and other sea-dwelling favorites, to complement the two wine gardens and their 20-plus varieties. There will be live music on two stages, wine and food pairing seminars and plenty of vendors.

It’s not Lollapalooza or Coachella (at least not yet), but Palm Beach County finally has its own festival of hip, relevant alternative and indie bands to rival its massive, big-city brethren. The 11 bands performing at the inaugural Coastline festival constitute a powerful dance-rock pantheon, including the smart, arena-filling synthpop act Passion Pit; thunderous Welsh rockers The Joy Formidable; the Brooklyn couple/duo Matt & Kim; and chart-topping Irish rockers Two Door Cinema Club, along with West Palm Beach’s own indie-rock breakthrough, Surfer Blood. The festival bills itself as a “Musiculinary experience” that includes a variety of food trucks, a Craft Beer Cove with more than 25 selections, and an Isle of Art featuring the work of Florida artists.

Go ahead, say what you want about Kenny G. Say that his smooth jazz has created lite-FM ubiquity out of excruciating elevator Muzak, that he doesn’t belong in the true jazz pantheon, that he has silly hair. He’ll continue to ignore these barbs, go his own way and sell, like, a zillion more records. The 30-year music veteran, top-selling instrumental musician of the modern era, and Guinness record holder for the longest note ever recorded on a saxophone doesn’t care what critics and fellow-musicians think. And besides, he has enough friends in the industry who have collaborated with him, namely more modern marquee acts like Weezer, Robin Thicke and Babyface. He’s Kenny freakin’ G.